1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to technique for identifying layout of surface regions on an object by means of image area segmentation.
2. Description of the Related Art
An inspection apparatus such as a printed circuit board tester detects a defect in a product subject to testing by comparing the layout of each surface region on the product, which is identified from an image of the product, with layout of each surface region on a reference product. With some kind of inspection apparatus, to identify layout of each surface region on an object, area segmentation is performed for dividing the image of the object into a plurality of areas.
However, on the object surface, there are cases when there are regions of the surface for which the reflection characteristics are different, such as metal, a dielectric, and so on. When segmentation according to color or color depth is performed on an image captured from this kind of object, even when illumination conditions are devised, there are cases that it is not possible to identify the layout of the surface regions on the object by means of image area segmentation.